On December 31, 2017, Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act will sunset. Officials insist that the provision authorizes critical intelligence gathering, but as of yet, Congress has not signaled whether it will give a clean reauthorization of the bill, pass it with amendments, or allow it to lapse altogether. In this week's podcast, Susan Hennessey sits down with FBI General Counsel Jim Baker and the Bureau's Executive Assistant Director of the National Security Branch Carl Ghattas to discuss the legal and operational elements of Section 702.

This week on the Lawfare Podcast, Jack Goldsmith interviews Graham Allison at the Hoover Book Soiree about Allison's new book, Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides's Trap?. The conversation covers the history of rising and declining powers, how the North Korean regime affects the security dynamic between U.S. and China, and how to preserve peace where Thucydides would predict war.

At this point, it’s widely accepted that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election; the question now is what the United States should do about it. At Third Way, Mieke Eoyang, Evelyn Farkas, Ben Freeman, and Gary Ashcroft have a new paper on the subject, titled “The Last Straw: Responding to Russia’s Anti-Western Aggression.” Mieke and Evelyn came to the studio to talk with Benjamin Wittes about their proposals, which range from sanctions to FARA reforms.

This week, Ben discusses recent events in cybersecurity with Matt Tait. Matt shared his views on WannaCry, NotPetya, and what companies and governments can do to protect against such attacks in the future.

Today, Shane Harris of The Wall Street Journal published an article entitled "GOP Operative Sought Clinton Emails From Hackers, Implied a Connection to Flynn." He sat down with Benjamin Wittes to discuss the story in this special edition of the podcast.

This week, in Israel, Ben had two conversations about the television show Fauda. On Tuesday, Ben spoke with Avi Issacharoff, the show's co-creator and a journalist at the Times of Israel and Walla!. Then, on Thursday, Ben talked to Brig. Gen. Dov "Fufi" Sedaka, a former Israeli special operator and former head of the Civil Administration in the West Bank. With each, Ben discussed Fauda's portrayal of the complicated lives of Israeli special operators, as well as perceptions of the show in Israel and the Palestinian territories.

This week, the Lawfare Podcast brings you Jack Goldsmith's interview with Dan Drezner at the Hoover Book Soirée about Drezner's new book, The Ideas Industry: How Pessimists, Partisans, and Plutocrats are Transforming the Marketplace of Ideas. The conversation covers how polarization, inequality, and mistrust are changing the way ideas influence policy and public opinion.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions faced questioning from the Senate Intelligence Committee today. He answered questions on his recusal, on his role in James Comey's firing, on his disputed conversation with the former FBI Director, and on his meetings with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. He also declined to answer a lot of questions about his conversations with President Trump—without an assertion of executive privilege.

We stripped out all the extraneous material, leaving just the questions and answers: no repetition, no senatorial speechifying.

We left in every question that produced new information, and that's all we left in. It's everything you actually need from today's hearing in 90 minutes.

As the dust settles following former FBI Director James Comey’s testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee, the Lawfare Podcast brings you expert views on what exactly happened yesterday and what it means for the Trump administration going forward. Benjamin Wittes sat down with Carrie Cordero, a former attorney at the National Security Division of the Justice Department, and Paul Rosenzweig, who worked for Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr, for a conversation on the Comey testimony and its implications.

In much-anticipated testimony today, former FBI Director James Comey spoke before the Senate Intelligence Committee on the subject of his many interactions with President Donald Trump prior to his dismissal. The testimony took up a tight three hours, but there were still plenty of repetitions and instances in which the former Director was unable to answer questions in an open session. To save you from all that, we at Lawfare are providing you with a bare-bones, just-the-facts version of Comey's testimony today. It's the distilled version of what we've all been waiting to hear.